OVERLAND PARK, Kan., Dec. 7, 2017 — At the National Workers' Compensation and Disability Conference 2017 in Las Vegas, Nev., Bardavon Health Innovations and Planned Administrators, Inc. (PAI), a third party administrator for property and casualty, announced an integrated commercial health and workers' compensation solution for large employers nationwide.

Employers who participate in this program will be able to enhance workforce productivity and population health outcomes. These insights, not previously available to employers, are achieved through seamless integration of relevant clinical, cost and quality information among commercial health insurers, wellness programs and workers' compensation programs.

This program will create synergistic enhancements to traditionally disparate channels. Bardavon's cloud-based architecture and big data solutions will provide the technology needed for tighter integration of workers' compensation best practices and wellness programs.

The effort is uniquely valuable to large employers nationwide who continue to grapple with rising health care costs and lost employee productivity, due in large part to musculoskeletal injuries and disabilities. (It is well-established that musculoskeletal injuries drive 16 to 18 percent of total U.S. health care spending.)

Bardavon's clinical intelligence and analytics capabilities put control of workers' compensation spending and quality measurement back in the hands of employers using a data-driven, high-transparency solution. The program combines and streamlines the often-siloed components that service a workers' compensation claim into one process.

Moreover, this integrated service provides near real-time information and establishes an employer-directed set of customized quality metrics that can be tracked and measured consistently at an individual patient and provider level throughout the continuum of care.

According to Matt Schaffer, senior vice president of Major Groups Division at BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina, he is seeing robust employer interest and has a commitment for January 1, 2018 participation. He said, “We are enthusiastic about the significant potential for our large, regional and national self-insured customers to mitigate cost trends and improve the health of their employees. This union of expertise, data and transparency among PAI, health insurance partners and Bardavon, brings unmatched opportunity in its integration of commercial health and workers' compensation care. It is a market differentiator.”

Over a three-year period, a Midwest grocery chain customer of Bardavon has achieved results that favorably impacted workers' compensation and commercial health program metrics, including:

Reduced workers' compensation exposure by 30%;

Commercial health costs associated with musculoskeletal care decreased by 32% over the same period; and

The chain's management attributes these improvements to the effectiveness of its workers' compensation programs.

“The problem in workers' compensation management is that employers don't have outcome-based, actionable insight into the quality of care their employees are receiving,” said Matt Condon, CEO of Bardavon. “Together with PAI and our health insurance partners, we are driving actual value-based medicine, functional outcomes, and population health improvements. Our technology is changing the way employers manage the health and health care of their biggest asset, their employees.”

Condon presented the findings and approach of this new integrated model Thursday afternoon at the National Workers' Compensation Conference. With the announcement of this partnership, both PAI and Bardavon hope to expand their efforts in health care through PAI's experience in third party administration coupled with Bardavon's proprietary technology and proven data approach to improving outcomes in workers' compensation programs, and in the future, commercial health.

For more information about this partnership, please contact Cadie Connors [email protected].

About Bardavon: Bardavon is a venture-backed, cloud-based clinical intelligence and analytics company steeped in 14 years of data-driven workers' compensation best practices. Our mission is to advance outcomes for patients by changing how patient care outcomes are measured. The Company provides employers with near-real time data to measure the quality of care, streamline workflows and processes and apply big data analytics to optimize clinical pathways for all musculoskeletal care, including workers' compensation and commercial health programs. Bardavon's offerings are relevant to large employers because the medical costs and financial risk associated with musculoskeletal injury represent the lion share of workers' compensation exposure and is the single largest category of cost for commercial health and short/long-term disability programs. www.bardavon.com

About PAI: PAI is a leading administrator for employee benefit plans, from medical and wellness programs to specialty products and workers' compensation. PAI offers a full slate of administrative services on a broad portfolio of benefit plans to support self-funded clients and insurance carriers. Licensed nationally, PAI has built a reputation for providing flexible administrative solutions, outstanding service, and analytics, which offer true value to our customers. www.paisc.com

Brad Bennett

Brad grew up in a small town in northern Iowa. He studied chemistry in college, graduated, and married his wife one month later. They were then blessed with two baby boys within the first four years of marriage. Having babies gave their family a desire to return to the old paths – to nourish their family with traditional, homegrown foods; rid their home of toxic chemicals and petroleum products; and give their boys a chance to know a simple, sustainable way of life. They are currently building a homestead from scratch on two little acres in central Texas. There’s a lot to be done to become somewhat self-sufficient, but they are debt-free and get to spend their days living this simple, good life together with their five young children.